Radioactive Fallout and Fieldwork (Worldwide)

[Dinosaur]

Risk assessments can only reasonably cover known or suspected hazards, it's surprising how many ostensibly 'green-field' sites have nasties buried on them, in fact there can't be many sites that don't contain some sort of hazardous substance (or offices for that matter - eg toner). I've worked in any number of fields where bits of blue asbestos have turned up for instance, if we declared it all (those with the experience/training to recognise the stuff anyway) then most sites would be shut down and we'd all be out of a job...most 'hazardous' substances (eg all types of asbestos) are actually pretty benign when mixed with soil and damp (its only hazardous when occurring as dust and inhaled), but the regs don't have enough sense to acknowledge that - as an eg, did a job years back (in less H&S conscious times) where we'd noticed that the mini-digger bucket was getting very clean and shiny, and eventually figured out that the glass vials we'd been digging through occasionally were full of concentrated sulphuric acid (bit of school chemistry at play) - since the stuff was reacting immediately with its surroundings and neutralising itself not really a hazard (apart from the broken glass), but declaring it would have made us all suddenly unemployed

- anyone know what the state of play is with declaring bits of roofing asbestos (which turns up everywhere), spun-asbestos pipe etc?